"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society." - George Washington

Does Bugs know that the self is something the ego creates? So he doesn't imagine anything and just deals with the moment. In other words...

Changing perspectives can be as easy as
changing as putting on a hat (it's like being a parent to your kids
& an employee to your boss, i.e. you 'wear different hats' in
interacting with each individual):

Being in sync with The Tao of Bugs means that you are not limited to being any particular 'self' or person. If you feel like you have low self-esteem you can change that self. If you feel like you are not comfortable is social situations, you can change that image too. Any limiting image you have of yourself can be changed as you create your 'self' or how you want to be.

Going deeper into the
hat analogy in the first video above (the following 25 minute cartoon
was written to help people understand basic child psychology)...

Bodhidharma was probably a teacher of yoga and qigong, as were many of the teachers of his day. His writings cover only his philosophy of mind which came to be known as “Zen”.

“You ask. That’s your mind. I answer. That’s my mind. If I had no mind, how could I answer? If you had no mind, how could you ask? That which asks is your mind.”

The act of perceiving anything, be it a question, or a thought, an image – anything – is an act of the mind.

When you ask for a definition of the mind, it is the mind that asks about itself.

“But the mind has no form and its awareness no limit.”

Any form or image you can imagine is a creation of your mind.

“All appearances are illusions. They have no fixed existence, no constant form. They’reimpermanent.” (also read "The Nature of the Self")

People grow and idle. Mountains erode over the millennia by the wind and rain. Given a large enough perspective on time, everything is impermanent. Everything is a ‘flow’ of the force. As quantum mechanics describe it, the material world (matter) is like foam on the patterns of vibration which pervades the universe. As long as you re attached to appearances, your unaware that your mind is empty. By clinging to appearances you lose your connection with the force [i.e. you cannot be grounded if your mental balance is attached to something that is constantly changing or is by it's very nature 'impermanent'] . (Also read this article.)

Since any conception is a creation of your mind, then it follows that your mind is basically empty. (it creates your thoughts, what creates it? As you think of an answer, notice, it is the mind coming up with more images/words describing itself)“The mind’s capacity is limitless, and its manifestations are inexhaustible. Seeing forms with your eyes, hearing sounds with your ears, smelling odors with your nose, tasting flavors with your tongue, every movement or state is all your mind. At every moment, where language can’t go, that’s your mind.”

Every time you try to imagine something outside of your mind you can’t, because it is your mind that is doing the perceiving. To know that the object you see is a tree, is a conception you have that you have imposed on it. To see an object with out defining it, is still your mind but in a state of direct experience – with out any conception.

Definition of Enlightenment = heightened awareness that can be maintained constantlyDefinition of Nirvana = a state where the self (or yourself that you create in your mind) ceases to exist and all the world is experienced directly.“To search for enlightenment or nirvana beyond this mind is impossible.”

Translation: The idea here is that as soon as you begin ‘seeking’ an experience, you have put that experience into a category and separated it from yourself.

Then you chase this conception you have of what ‘enlightenment’ or ‘nirvana’ should be.

As long as you have an image to chase, i.e. your mind is chasing something it has created; you will be like a donkey with a carrot forever just out of reach, going round and round attaining nothing. Why? Because all enlightenment/nirvana are attributes of your mind itself. You already have what you seek. So looking for what you already have is pointless .

Goal: Letting go of the self-reflexive aspect of the mind and experiencing yourself and your environment with greater awareness.

This is a great meditation to 'get out of your head' and expand your awareness of your surroundings.

While walking start becoming aware of your breath. Expand this awareness to include the feel of the clothes on your body and the feel of your feet on the ground. While continuing your awareness of your breath and body, become aware of the place you are walking and the scenery around you. Finally, being aware of breath, body and surroundings add the huge dome of the sky above you and the earth below you. Breathe deeply and relish this expanded sense of awareness.

"Long ago he had heard of an old Chinese saying to the effect that any man who could concentrate for as much as three minutes on any given problem could rule the world. The thought had remained in his mind, and he had cultivated the ability to apply all his intelligence to any given situation. To close out everything from his mind but one idea to be considered had taken long practice, but much of his success had been due to that ability to concentrate, to formulate the problem, to bring to it all the information and knowledge he had, and to reach a decision."Book of Flint

-Keep your attention only on your breathing. Be aware of each inhale and exhale.

-If you notice your mind drifting (i.e. if you start thinking about something) then just return your attention back to your breathing. It doesn’t matter if your mind wanders as long you bring your attention back to your breathing as soon as you notice your attention is not solely on your breathing.

-Do this for 5-15 minutes.

This meditation is very simple yet very powerful. Studies have shown that this simple form of meditation increases your brain size in areas such as attention and memory. The following extract is from an article from Time Magazine:

"Everyone around the water cooler knows that meditation reduces stress. But with the aid of advanced brainscanning technology, researchers are beginning to show that meditation directly affects the function and structure of the brain, changing it in ways that appear to increase attention span, sharpen focus and improve memory." from Time Magazine's article "How To Get Smarter One Breath At A Time"

The Emotional Nature Of Decision Making

The myth that 'Man is a rational animal' is so old that people often believe it without question. A modern philosopher, Bertrand Russell, has made this comment on the belief of our rationality, "It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this."Of course, this was a long time ago and was a comment based on personal observation.

Nowadays, we need studies (which is a good thing if insight into human nature can be proven for consensus), so...

Study: Emotion rules the brain's decisionsThe
evidence has been piling up throughout history, and now neuroscientists
have proved it's true: The brain's wiring emphatically relies on
emotion over intellect in decision-making. A brain-imaging
study reported in the current Science examines "framing," a hot topic
among psychologists, economists and political hucksters. Framing studies
have shown that how a question is posed — think negative ads, for
instance — skews decision-making. But no one showed exactly how this
effect worked in the human brain until the brain-imaging study led by
Benedetto De Martino of University College London. The brain images
revealed the amygdala, a neural region that processes strong negative
emotions such as fear, fired up vigorously in response to each
two-second (on average) gambling decision. Where people resisted the
framing effect, a brain region connected to positive emotions such as
empathy, and another that activates whenever people face choices, lit up
as well, seeming to duke it out over the decision. "We found everyone showed emotional biases, more or less; no one was totally free of them,"
De Martino says. Even among the four participants who were aware they
were inconsistent in decision-making, "they said, 'I know, I just
couldn't help myself,' " he says.

Research into organizational decision making has shown a similar result...

Toxic Decision Processes: A Study of Emotion and Organizational Decision Making
Organizational research has increasingly recognized the emotional
nature of organizations and organizational life. We now widely accept
organizations as "emotional arenas" and acknowledge the emotionally
saturated nature of people’s work experience. Even decision-making
research, one of the most cognitively oriented domains of organizational
behavior, shows a growing concern for the role of emotion. The
emotionality of organizational decision processes can be very subtle, as
in many highly routinized decisions, while other issues provoke
intensely emotional decision processes. Potential mergers, acquisitions,
and downsizing, for instance, can have dramatic effects on how
employees feel about themselves and their organizations; knowing this
can have significant impact on the way these decisions are made.

Given
how emotions affect our decision making its obvious that the more
balanced our emotions are the better our decision making skills will be.
This approach is addressed in the concept of Emotional Intelligence in
basic psychology. The following gives an outline of this approach...

Emotional
intelligence (EI) refers to the ability to perceive, control and
evaluate emotions. Some researchers suggest that emotional intelligence
can be learned and strengthened, while others claim it is an inborn
characteristic.

1. Perceiving
Emotions: The first step in understanding emotions is to accurately
perceive them. In many cases, this might involve understanding nonverbal
signals such as body language and facial expressions.

2.
Reasoning With Emotions: The next step involves using emotions to
promote thinking and cognitive activity. Emotions help prioritize what
we pay attention and react to; we respond emotionally to things that
garner our attention.

3. Understanding
Emotions: The emotions that we perceive can carry a wide variety of
meanings. If someone is expressing angry emotions, the observer must
interpret the cause of their anger and what it might mean. For example,
if your boss is acting angry, it might mean that he is dissatisfied with
your work; or it could be because he got a speeding ticket on his way
to work that morning or that he's been fighting with his wife.

4.
Managing Emotions: The ability to manage emotions effectively is a key
part of emotional intelligence. Regulating emotions, responding
appropriately and responding to the emotions of others are all important
aspect of emotional management.

Note:The
idea that emotional intelligence could be only inborn and not have
anything to do with life experiences seems to contradict the idea that
environment has any effect on behaviour. However, rather than arguing
that point in this general article, I thought I would just point out
that even simple changes in environment can change our emotional outlook
and therefore our decision making.

The gambler knew the story of the gunfight at The Crossing, but there was nothing to connect the youngster of that shooting with the immaculate New York financier.The gambler had recieved his first hint that all was not as he had expected during the early part of the game. Kettleman played shrewdly and with icy control, and the gambler quickly grasped that he himself was being studied with cool calculated interest. As part of his scheme, the gambler delibertaley invited an accusation of cheating whenever a showdown developed between Kettleman and himself, but Kettleman ignored the opportunity, and the gambler grew worried.Nothing was going as planned, and he began to realize that his opponent knew what he was trying to do, and was deliberately avoiding it. So anxious was he to lead Kettleman into an argument that his mind was not on the game, and suddenly he lost a large pot.Suddenly, he looked at the table and realized that he himself had been cheated, with coolness and effontery. He had been stripped of more than six thousand dollars with the skill of a professional. His eyes lifted to Kettleman's."You have been looking for trouble," Kettleman said quietly. "I am offering it to you."The gambler was nervous. He touched his toungue to his lips and felt the sweat beading his forehead."You are looking for trouble," Kettleman said. "Why?"There was no one close by. "I am going to kill you," the gambler said."If you wish to leave the game, we can divide the pot, and I will forget what you have said."It was there then - a way out. As a gambler he knew he should take it, but gambling was only a part of his business and he had his pride."I cannot I have been paid.""There are other ways to make a living and you have chosen the wrong one. I am offering you your last chance. Get out.""I gave my word. I took their money."Kettleman had seemed almost negligent. "When you are ready, then."The gambler stepped back quickly, overturning his chair. "If you say I cheat," he said loudly, "you are a liar!" And he grasped his gun.Everybody saw him grasp the gun, everybody saw him start to draw it, and then he started coughing and there was blood on his shirt, blood dribbling down his chin, and on his face the realization of death.Kettleman leaned over him. He looked down at the gambler and knew this man was only a step away from the man he was himself. "I didn't want to kill you," he said. "Who hired you?""Your wife," the gambler said. "And her father."Kettleman realized then that he had known something like this would happen. He started to rise but the gambler caught his wrist. "I must know. Who are you?"Kettleman hesitated. For the first time since that night he spoke of it. "I was the kid at The Crossing."God!" The gambler was excited. He started to rise, began to speak, and then he died.

Definition of EMPATHY 1 : the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it 2 : the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also : the capacity for this Examples of EMPATHY 1. He felt great empathy with the poor. 2. His months spent researching prison life gave him greater empathy towards convicts. 3. Poetic empathy understandably seeks a strategy of identification with victims … —Helen Vendler, New Republic, 5 May 2003A Bugs Bunny Intro to empathy...

The above video can help break the "Us vs. Them" mental dynamicAbove: Sam Richards is a sociologist and award-winning teacher who has been inspiring undergraduate students at Penn State since 1990. Every semester, 725 students register for his Race and Ethnic Relations course, one of the most popular classes at Penn State and the largest of its kind in the country. Through his natural ability of seeing a subject from many angles, Richards encourages students to engage more fully with the world and to think for themselves — something he did not do until his third year in college. Because of his passion for challenging students to open their minds, an interviewer recently referred to him as "an alarm clock for eighteen-year-olds."

Experience or lack of experience is a big factor in empathy.

Many of the modern billionaires, especially the ones with the most power and influence come from 'old money'. i.e. they have always been rich. These people don't resemble the self-made men that America so admires but people who have had little or no need to struggle. Have never been hungry unless they wanted to, have never worried about being able to buy food or services of any kind (as long as their plane hasn't crashed on a desert island). If you get everything you want (well, mostly) and don't understand the meaning of hard work or struggle to make ends meet, how can you empathize with people who do have to do this? In other words, some of these rich people with economic and political power resemble the people who were in charge in British Colonial days. In other words, people without much empathy. [Note: Keep in mind that this will not apply to everyone with money or even everyone you think is rich given your economic situation - This is just a basic understanding of how empathy works.]

There is actually a study on thiseffect of, what I like to call, 'experience linking to empathy' - i.e. those without experience lack ability to step into another's shoes and so lack the mental ability to feel what another person might feel in their experience until they actually have, at least some, experience of what another person has gone through. Here is the study...

In the first experiment, participants were asked to look at pictures of faces and indicate which emotions were being expressed. The more upper class the judges, the less able they were to accurately identify emotions in others. In another experiment, upper-class participants had a harder time reading the emotions of strangers during simulated job interviews. In the third one — an interesting twist of an experiment — people of greater socioeconomic status were asked to compare themselves to the wealthiest, most powerful Americans, thus diminishing their own relative stature. When asked to identify emotions by looking at 36 sets of emoting eyes, they did markedly better than their upper-class peers. Here’s why: Earlier studies have suggested that those in the lower classes, unable to simply hire others, rely more on neighbors or relatives for things like a ride to work or child care. As a result, the authors propose, they have to develop more effective social skills — ones that will engender good will. “Upper-class people, in spite of all their advantages, suffer empathy deficits,” Dr. Keltner said. “And there are enormous consequences.” In other words, a high-powered lawyer or chief executive, ill equipped to pick up on more-subtle emotions, doesn’t make for a sympathetic boss.

Bestselling
author, political adviser and social and ethical prophet Jeremy Rifkin
investigates the evolution of empathy and the profound ways that it has
shaped our development and our society.Note:
His use of the word "fiction" is to describe an idea that extends the
mental conception of family. A traditional compassionate/empathic view
is often is of all of humanity as part of a 'family' with disagreements.
For example, global charity organizations or Mother Teresa. [ Every
religion has scripture related to this, see TheCharterForCompassion.org ].

“If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.” ― Dalai Lama XIV

In ancient India a concept developed called ‘Maya’
which means illusion. Since the world is considered impermanent and
constantly changing - and you can interpret it in many ways with your
mind - it is considered to be an illusion. Thus a common, though
ancient, psychological perspective on 'attachment': if you hold on to it
as your psychological/mental foundation, you are holding on to
something that will dissolve away - eventually - so you are holding on
to something which is inherently unstable. Note:
The ancient idea of the world/universe as an 'illusion' has re-emerged
in modern physics as the idea of the world and universe as a hologram from string theory (approx 5 minutes into following video)...

[Also read about the movie Mindwalkfor perspectives on physics. Watch it 3 times if possible]

Siddhartha
(Buddha) agreed with the basic premise of ancient Indian philosophy
that the world is an illusion... but he took it one step further,
claiming that not only is the world an illusion, so is the ’self’. (Impermanence)

To
put it in other words; you are not the person you were a year ago. You
know this. You can probably see the ways in which you’ve changed and
grown over the last year. You probably see the world in a different way
then you did a year ago (or ten years ago). Since you see the world
differently, you have a different image of yourself as well. You define
yourself differently than you did 10 years ago. What you are capable of,
what you can do, who you are, all these definitions tend to change for
every person - given enough time. The ancient philosophers noticed that
as soon as you imagine a event happening to you - or your role in any
situation - you first have to place yourself in it (i.e. you have to
imagine your role or character) then you decide what to do or how to
feel (this all tends to happen very fast for most events). In other
words, every time you imagine yourself or a situation that you are in
you are, in a sense, recreating yourself.

Scientific American Mind magazine in an interview with the Nobel laureate Neuroscientist Eric Kandel (click here to read article)Mind:
We tend to think of memory as a kind of library that holds a record of
events and facts that can be retrieved as needed. Is this an accurate
metaphor? Kandel: No, memory is not like that at all. Human
memory reinvents itself all the time. Every time you remember something,
you modify it a little bit, in part dependent on the context in which
you recall it. That is because the brain’s storage is not as exact as
written text. It is always a mixture of many facades of the past event:
images, pictures, feelings, words, facts and fiction—a “re-collection”
in the true sense. Modern nuero-science agrees with the Buddhist idea of an impermanent self. As Eric Kandel points out that, “Every time you remember something, you modify it a little bit, in part dependent on the context in which you recall it.”

In
other words you recreate your image of yourself to fit the new
situation. If the self was something permanent and real, then your image
of yourself would always remain the same. The fact that you can
consciously or unconsciously change your image of yourself and react to
situations in a new way - or just create a new you - proves that the
self is something you make up as part of living in society. What does this mean?
This means that you are not limited to being any particular ’self’ or
person. If you feel like you have low self-esteem you can change that
self. If you feel like you are not comfortable is social situations, you
can change that image too. Any limiting image you have of yourself can
be changed as you create your 'self' or how you want to be.

To walk the path of Bugs you gotta relax & learn to go with the flow...

“All appearances are illusions. They have no fixed existence, no constant form. They’re impermanent.”

People grow and idle. Mountains erode over the millennia by the wind and rain. Given a large enough perspective on time, everything is impermanent. Everything is a ‘flow’ of the force. As quantum mechanics describe it, the material world (matter) is like foam on the patterns of vibration which pervades the universe.
Since any conception is a creation of your mind, then it follows that your mind is basically empty. (it creates your thoughts, what creates it? So as you think of an answer it is the mind coming up with more images describing itself).

As a global culture we fix ourselves in 'palaces' of what is familiar and secure. We sense there is more to life than trying to gratify our desires and defend ourselves from fear. Yet we don’t know how to get their and this leads to even more activities of distraction.

For Example; We all know that the only certainty in life is death. If we keep the inevitability of death on our minds many things we worry about will no longer matter. Instead we try to avoid that thought at all costs to the point where when we encounter death we are shocked and terrified and say, 'his/her time came early'. There is no such thing. Without the perspective of our death how can we possibly make short or long term decisions that aren’t influenced by drowning ourselves in momentary pleasures?

"When everyone recognizes beauty as beautiful,there is already ugliness:When everyone recognizes goodness as good,there is already evil."To be" and "not to be" arise mutually;Difficult and easy are mutually contrasted;High and low are mutually posited; ...Before and after are in mutual sequence."Tao Te Ching

Death is always there waiting for you, every day of your life. It is sad, depressing, part of the sorrow of life, but it is not 'early'.

What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset. - Blackfoot

Think about it. How do you know that someone is alive? By the simple fact that he/she is not dead. In other words, death defines life. Without death we would not know what life is. So by avoiding the acceptance of death we become escapists of life itself. Chasing momentary pleasures to cloud our awareness and our fears.

If you are constantly making life to be some perfect image to be attained at some point in the future, you will ALWAYS be chasing that image. If you cannot be content now you will never be content as there will always be something else you 'need' before you can be happy. A bigger car, a bigger house, a plane? This will give a rush of excitement followed by boredom with your new toy and craving for the next one.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't enjoy expensive things just that you should be happy first or nothing you get will ever satisfy you. (“Be bountiful and multiply”)

If you jump from one emotion to another, blindly avoiding pain and seeking pleasure with no awareness or separation from your emotions THEN your emotions will control you. You will be a slave to your desire. Anyone who knows your desires can control you.

"The perfect Way {Tao} is without difficulty,Save that it avoids picking and choosing.Only when you stop liking and dislikingWill all be clearly understood.A split hair's difference,And heaven and earth are set apart!If you want to get the plain truth,Be not concerned with right and wrong.The conflict between right and wrongIs the sickness of the mind."

Quotes

"Make peace with the universe. Take joy in it. It will turn to gold. Resurrection will be now. Every moment, a new beauty." - Rumi

"God is a metaphor for that which transcends all levels of intellectual thought. It's as simple as that." - Joseph Campbell

"Naturally, every age thinks that all ages before it were prejudiced, and today we think this more than ever and are just as wrong as all previous ages that thought so. How often have we not seen the truth condemned! It is sad but unfortunately true that man learns nothing from history." - Carl Jung

“If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.” - Dalai Lama

“Be empty of worrying. Think of who created thought! Why do you stay in prison. When the door is so wide open?” ― Rumi